Ethical Concept

The Ethics of Industrial Disasters in a Transnational World: The Elusive Quest for Justice and Accountability in Bhopal Author(s):
Ward Morehouse Source: Alternatives: Global, Local, Political, Vol. 18, No. 4 (Fall 1993), pp. 475-504 Published by: Sage Publications, Inc. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40644786 . Accessed: 08/04/2013 10:00
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18 (1993), 475-504 Alternatives
Disasters The Ethics ofIndustrial in a Transnational World: and The Elusive Quest for Justice in Bhopal Accountability
Ward Morehouse*
The Basic Hypothesis isgenerally ofwhat oftheperpetrator Thisarticle examines thebehavior leak from world's worst the as the industrial disaster gas regarded has been in which Union Carbide'spesticides India, plant Bhopal, look to ofthechemical It seeks calledthe"Hiroshima beyond industry." of behavior. such and for that at remedies prevention tragedy on morals." is "a treatise ofethics definitions thedictionary Among - morals defined as "moral Thispaperis intended tobejustthat being and proper" moralas "right or teachings" and the adjective conduct of rightand wrongin and "concerned withestablishing principles behavior."1 rather than I offer the centralthesisof the paper as hypothesis but rather notbecause I have any doubtsaboutitsveracity theorem because I have notyetexaminedenoughcases to knowhowwidely - onlysome of it it can be applied.But thereis abundantevidence here so as not to the reader's patienceand endurance try presented of the behavior toward thevictims thatUnionCarbideCorporation's immoral. wasessentially Bhopaldisaster I haveyetto comeacrossanyother of a recent and major instance in which the industrial disaster a prevailing involvinglargecorporation toward of the disaster of the behaviorof the perpetrator character has been anydifferent, there are thevictims although varying certainly
Council on Internationaland Public Affairs, 777 United Nations Plaza, New York,NY 10017. This is a revisedversionof a paper preparedforthe Second ComparativeScience and CultureConference,Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley,Massachusetts, May 810, 1992. Research for this paper was supported in part by the American Instituteof Indian Studies.
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is generally degrees of immoralbehavior.I suspectthatthishypothesis true of largeinstitutions. Certainlythere are on the face of it all too financialinstitutions manyinstancesof similarbehaviorbymultilateral - forexample,theWorld their toward victims and national governments Bank towardthe oustees fromthe Narmada Dam Projectin India or the US governmenttoward victims of radiation poisoning in the Asian Marshall Islands.2 In a dozen cases from as many different countries,presented to the third session of the Permanent People's Hazards and Human Rights, Tribunalon Industrialand Environmental similar patternsof immoralbehavior were exhibited by perpetrators of these disasters,which ranged frommultinationalcorporationsto government agencies.3 Union Carbide is hardly the only Indeed, in the Bhopal tragedy, bad actor.There is littleredeeming and much that seems to me to of Madhya Pradesh (the be wickedin the behavior of the government state in which Bhopal is located) toward its own citizens. In many less "wicked."These of India is only slightly the government respects, are essentially the conclusions reached by the Permanent People's Tribunal, which,although not a court of law but of public opinion, - something came the closest to givingthe victims their"day in court" have not yetexperienced afteralmost a decade in any theycertainly established court of law in either India or the United States. Having from receivedboth oral and written victims, workers, experts, testimony and others at all three sessions of the tribunal (Yale, Bangkok, and Bhopal), the Bhopal session of the tribunal concluded that "Union Carbide Corporation, its subsidiary,Union Carbide India Ltd., and key officialsof both are clearly guiltyof having caused the world's of India and the worstindustrialdisaster"and that"The Government Governmentof Madhya Pradesh are also clearly guiltyof violating the rightsof the victims, not only under internationalhuman rights law but also under the Indian Constitution."4 I shall concentratehere on Union Carbide because I have had more to observe its behavior somewhatmore closely than that opportunity in the stillunfolding of otheractors,bad or otherwise, Bhopal tragedy. the US Union Carbide on parent of the Corporation By focusing - I also introduce a Indian subsidiary,Union Carbide India Ltd. transnationaldimension: a large US industrialcorporationoperating in another and seemingly distant social and political context. Furthermore, concentrating on one major actor- the ultimate - also enables me to achieve somewhat perpetratorof this disaster greaterfocus in my examination of remedies for and preventionof such immoralbehavior.
Ward Morehouse 477
Industrial Disaster: Chronicle The World's Worst

Genesis
in India go backto thebeginning ofthis UnionCarbide's operations It was one of its there. when it began marketing products century, in active India to the veryfewUS companies prior independence to be the was considered because India, as a colonial possession, In an of British plant companies. 1924, assembly protected preserve for batterieswas opened in Calcutta. By 1983, Union Carbide manufactured in India,which (UCC) had fourteen plants Corporation and other chemicals, batteries, pesticides, products. a Union Carbide'soperationsin India were conductedthrough Union Carbide India Ltd. (UCIL). UCC, the parentUS subsidiary, thebalance of49.1percent ofUCIL stock; held50.9percent company, financial sector Indianinvestors, wasowned byvarious including public havebeen limited to40 percent investors institutions. foreign Normally, ofequity in Indiancompanies, buttheIndiangovernment ownership in thecase ofUnionCarbidebecause of the waived thisrequirement ofitstechnology and thecompany's presumed potential sophistication for export. control ofUCIL was exercised byUnionCarbide through Managerial in HongKong. UCC has a reputation itsEastern Division, headquartered of havinga relatively of US corporate management amongobservers Theprecise control exercised nature ofthe centralized decisionmaking style. will be determined over itsIndiansubsidiary only bytheparent company in a court of ifUCC is compelled, of law, theactualcharacter to reveal - however to maintain fanciful itmay itwillstrive that control. Otherwise, - that seem ithad an arm's with itsIndiansubsidiary, length relationship Muchcloser to the to be one of several justhappening largeinvestors! I believe, is thereport ofa delegation ofinternational and Indian mark, oftheBhopal whomadean on-the-spot trade union officials investigation in April1985and observed and national that"Bhopalworkers tragedy and maintenance unionofficials maintain thateven minor production decisions were madebyHongKong."5 In 1969, UnionCarbidesetup a smallplantin Bhopalto formulate and herbicides a carbaryl base. a rangeof pesticides derivedfrom ofIndia'swholesale for thisinitiative wasthegovernment The impetus characterized embraceof the GreenRevolution agricultural strategy, and highuse ofmanufactured and energy inputs. intensity bychemical bothmethyl Until1979, UCIL imported (MIC) and alpha isocyanate werereactedin the final from UCC. Those twochemicals naphthol MIC was theprincipal carbaramate stageofproducing pesticides. gas
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the Carbideplantin Bhopal to createthe disaster. thatleakedfrom to manufacture its own facility commissioned In 1979the company was locatedin the existing MIC in Bhopal.That facility plantto the ofthecity, to a residential ofthecenter north neighborhood adjacent station. from therailway and barely twokilometers has to be sought An explanation forthe December1984disaster MIC but in the not so muchin Carbide'sdecisionto manufacture into in which it did so. (Carbideclaimsthatitwas pressured manner India's of in the MIC policy government Bhopal by manufacturing their to"indigenize" ofurging bymaking production companies foreign themand in India rather than importing moreof the intermediates at of the end the or product assembling mixing components simply the At the finalstageof the production itself, designstage process.) substantial the questionof whether a controversy arose regarding "sister" at the so-called was it was for MIC (as required storage capacity West near located in to the one Charleston, Virginia) Bhopal, plant determined orwhether nominal process bydownstream solely storage, the basic design wouldsuffice. UCC, whichprovided requirements, and defined operating of the plant, supervisedits engineering, on the insisted run to UCIL, it, requirement. storage larger procedures in that was preferable on the otherhand,feltthatnominalstorage itwasinherently safer. Courtin New filedin theFederalDistrict affidavit the to According Carbide Union of the a retired Edward York Munoz, vice-president by at Indian of Carbide's director and subsidiary Corporation managing Indian its overrode theparent wasmade, this decision thetime company motivation The apparent on large-scale andinsisted storage. subsidiary forMIC as a bulk chemical market was the hope thata significant for sale to otherchemicalcompanieswoulddevelopin South and in Asia. This was the case withCarbide'sMIC production Southeast Carbide used was some MIC where theUnitedStates, by actually only and the balance was sold its own products, in making downstream in bulkto other chemical companies. feetin lengthand eight As a result, threetanksmeasuring forty each werebuilt, and E619, in diameter, code numbered feet E611, E610, reserve a was these One of of witha storage 15,000 gallons. capacity in the of material and used forthe transfer tankto be keptempty tanks. other of the either ofan emergency event involving
The ThreeMile Island oftheChemicalIndustry
E610erupted, tank On thenight ofDecember 2, 1984, spreading rapidly never shall We of over the 800,000 city people. deadlygases sleeping
Ward Morehouse 479
knowthe precisenumber thatdied on thatfateful but some night, estimates Even the Indian place the death toll as high as 10,000. conservative some 2,000 deaths government's figuresacknowledge thoseforwhom deathcertificates were thedisaster (essentially during a smallminority of thosethatactually died during issued,apparently victims are continuing Atanyrate, to die at the themassive tragedy). ormore a month from rateoffifty theofficial causes,so that gas-related - with deathtollnowhas risento morethan4,000 morehaving died thanin it.6 sincethedisaster to happen. It was a disaster waiting Bhopal was not an accident. It is also a textbook failure to meeteven the most case of corporate These standards minimalstandards of propersocial performance. include avoidance of destruction of human life and well-being, surely of nottomention the environment. Outright killing physical protection of people is a crimeeverywhere in theworld, and in any "civilized" musttake precedenceoverconventional social orderhumansafety criteria ofeconomic line. thecompany's bottom performance, including in Bhopal.Where occurred there were choices thereverse Butexactly and to be made,the Carbidemanagement profit optedto maximize with minimize loss, even thoughtheyknewthattheywereplaying innocent people'slives.
flawedDesign and Construction
The dominanceof economicover social performance criteriais manifest from the conceptual of the and stages planning designing in we As have the US noted, pesticide facility Bhopal. management in Asia the profitable line of businessit had in hoped to duplicate other theUS- manufacturing MIC notonlyfor itsownuse butalso for industrial customers. As we also have noted, specifically management and insisted on the wishesof Carbide'sIndian subsidiary overrode in in MIC than tanks rather the small large 15,000-gallon storing thatwerefavored containers and individual by its Indian managers havebeenmuch lessdangerous.7 that would Other including companies, in Japan,and DuPontin Texas,used Mitsubishi Bayerin Germany, inwhich either there is no MIC storage orstorage "closed-loop" systems in muchsmaller for such immediate use. However, storage quantities would have eliminated the possibility a "merchant of developing market" forMIC in India and other Asiancountries.8 of itsworkers The damning recordof willful of the safety neglect in andthesurrounding to maximize Carbide's desire community profits costs goes on and on. The safetysystems were by minimizing and could not have contained a of reaction underdesigned runaway
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TheEthics Disasters ina Transnational World ofIndustrial
MIC in suchlargestorage tanks. One suchsystem, which wassupposed to "neutralize" Atthe anyescapinggases,was theventgas scrubber. were MIC and its reaction reaction, heightof the runaway products thescrubber at more than200times itscapacity!9 flowing through - a device thatwas supposedto "burn off any The flaretower system.10 escapinggases was not equipped witha backupignition wouldnot have had the capacity Even if it had one, the flaretower tohandlesucha hugevolume ofescaping inBhopal.11 gasesas occurred which was the water to supposed deal with Finally, spraysystem, that the vent scrubber and the flare any gases gas escaped through to did nothave enoughwater reach the tower, highest pressure point All of these conditions of emission.12 were knownto the Carbide - or shouldhave been known if the and itsengineers13 management Carbideplantweregoing and use sucha highly to manufacture, store, toxic and unstable as MIC.And,ofcourse, couldhave they compound and been corrected, but only at an increasedcost of construction in of the facility Bhopal. manufacturing operation pesticide withcostEven the plantlocationwas dictated by a preoccupation an site the of outside cutting. Although unpopulated city Bhopal had an industrial for as area hazardous been facilities, designated already Union Carbide insistedon buildingthe acutelyhazardous MIC UnionCarbide andstorage unit atan existing facility upwind production a heavily from of the The majorreasonfor section populated city.14 in the operation of the MIC unit thiswas thatsubstantial economies and wouldbe possiblebecause it could drawon the infrastructure oftheexisting common services facility.
DangerousOperation
Notonlyin the designand construction of the plantbut also in its the Carbide of even the most record of shameful operation, neglect was evident. of responsible social performance minimalstandards to MIC should be stored at zero Although liquid degreescentigrade at tanks of a runaway the minimize the possibility reaction, storage were atambient theBhopalplant the because temperature refrigeration The freongas in the unit for the tank had been disconnected. unit wasbeingused elsewhere at theplant!15 refrigeration fill manualsstatethatthe maximum Union Carbide'soperations for to allow room tanks is 50 MIC for percent storage permitted reaction. ButtheMIC in thecase of a pressure-generating expansion tankin Bhopal was filledto 75-87 percent Furthermore, capacity.16 thattankwas supposedto be a backupintended onlyforemergency in thecase of a runaway transfers in twootherneighboring reaction
Ward Morehouse 481
was inoperative whenthe leak Even the flaretower tanks.17 storage and not section of pipe had been removed occurred because a faulty replaced.18 forthesafety callousdisregard A similar ofUnionCarbide's record is of its workers and the surrounding and well-being community Between in thecompany's and procedures. reflected personnel policies thework crewforthe MIC unitwas cutin half,from 1980and 1984, and the maintenance crewwas reducedfrom twelve to six workers, The maintenance six to twoworkers. supervisor positionhad been on dutyat the timeof the disaster.19 the workshift eliminated from was also adversely affected The qualityof plantpersonnel by high in theMIC unit in keypositions workers and several ratesofturnover, To top it trained to handle theirresponsibilities. werenot properly in a few available manuals were off, Although only English. operating was a it could read some foreign English, personnel plantoperating languageforthem,and manycould read only Hindi, theirnative language.20 in the wereknown to seniorCarbidemanagement These problems United States and cannot be blamed, as the US-based Carbide has triedto do, on its Indian subsidiary. Indeed, the management had been with serious accidents involving long plagued Bhopal plant and at leastone death(see Table 1). These accidents severeinjuries audit in to the US management and led to a safety werereported States.21 a sent from the United team 1982 by at UnionCarbide'sBhopalPlant Accidents Table1. Previous In 1976, accidents attheplant five serious workers resulting reported in blindness and chemical burnsto another. to one worker The alpha-naphthol storagearea had a huge fireon November in which was controlled ten hours;it resulted 24, 1978, onlyafter a lossofaboutRs 6 crores ($5 million). Plantoperator Mohammed Ashraf was killedby a phosgenegas Twoother workers wereinjured. leakon December 26,1981. Another in caused leak 1982 twenty-eight persons January phosgene to struggle months. between lifeand deathforseveral In August, a chemical receivedburnsover30 percent engineer ofhisbodyfrom MIC. liquid Threeelectrical on wereseverely burnedwhileworking operators on a control 1982. 22, system panel April On thenight of October5, 1982, isocyanate escaped from methyl Several a broken workers. valveand seriously affected four people
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World ina Transnational Disasters TheEthics Industrial of living in nearby colonies also experienced burning eyes and troubledue to the exposure. Two similarincidentswere breathing also reportedin 1983.
did littleto see that steps recommendedin Carbide unfortunately the 1982 safetyaudit to correctthese problems were taken. Despite the safetyaudit having described both "major" and "less serious" concerns with the plant, the corporation never, as far as can be conducteda formalfollow-up determined, survey. Union Carbide had actually been warned of the possibilityof a runawayreaction involvingan MIC storage tank three months prior to the Bhopal leak. In July 1984, Union Carbide operational safety WestVirginia,conducted a safety and health inspectorsin Institute, audit of the MIC II unit there. The findingsof the report released in September 1984 warned plant managers that a runawayreaction could occur. The internalcompany reportwas not made public until after the Bhopal leak had occurred, and then only because US CongressmanHenryWaxmanreleased it. ofUnion Warren Anderson,the chairmanand chiefexecutiveofficer Carbide at the timeof the disaster, respondedthatthe reportdescribed a "worstcase scenario." Had the warningsin the reportbeen heeded, in Bhopal (includingmore and the suggestedactionplans implemented for of tanks perhaps the Bhopal impurities), storage sampling frequent disaster could have been averted. But Union Carbide did not even send the reportto the Bhopal plant. Instead, according to Carbide's "a simplechange and environmental director of health,safety, affairs, in operating procedures completely eliminated the concern and eliminated the need for extensive changes in the equipment" in Institute. In Bhopal, therewas no such simplechange in procedures.22 The US managementalso set overall corporatepolicywithinwhich its Indian subsidiary was supposed to operate. But the crowning piece of evidence is that,because the Bhopal plant was losing moneyand the marketfor the pesticides it was producinghad not developed as Carbide at firsthoped it would, the US managementhad decided to dismantlethe plant in India and relocate fourof the units,including the MIC unit, to Mexico or Indonesia. The plan met with strong was aborted.23 UCIL managementand therefore resistancefrom
The MountingHuman Toll
For some victims, it seems almostas thoughthe luckyones were those who died immediately afterbeing exposed to the deadly gases from and psychological, theUnion Carbideplant.The suffering, bothphysical
Ward Morehouse 483
Insteadof has been intenseand protracted. victims of the surviving more often victims have the for their and suffering, sympathy help and abuse. to neglect, thannotbeen subjected harassment, thatthe majorimpactof MIC on human It was initially thought Bothofthesevitalorgansindeed was on their and eyes lungs. beings of thoseexposedto the in of thousands tens wereseriously damaged much to indicate is new medical evidence and ominous surfacing gas, to humanhealth.Othervitalorgans threats moreseriouslong-term as have and liver havealso been damaged, suchas thekidney, spleen, of is also evidence of women. There thereproductive genetic systems a new thuscreating theoffspring ofthoseexposed, mutation affecting ofdamage is evidence unborn. Atleastas alarming as yet classofvictims to themfarmoresusceptible immune to thevictims' leaving systems, a widerangeof diseasesendemicamongpoor people in India, such as tuberculosis.24 of the Carbide victims affected Indeed,almostall of the seriously who havea choice is those are The leak explanation simple: poor. gas For ofthese industrial of a downwind live plant. many dangerous rarely have to MIC of and other effects the destroyed gases exposure people, worked as casuallaborers, In thepast, their to earna living. they ability effort. able to sustain butthey are no longer vigorous physical claims than600,000 more hasregistered In all,theIndiangovernment the because losses are for economic of these Carbide. Many against weeks after for several economic lifeof the cityessentially stopped arespurious has asserted that most oftheseclaims Carbide thedisaster. The government itsclaim.25 evidenceto support buthas notrevealed which werevalid. theseclaimsto determine said thatitwas screening the under was But as that suddenly way, government just process getting with UnionCarbide of$470million settlement toan out-of-court agreed in February 1989. and was That settlement publicindignation widespread provoked and in victim court by ultimately immediately groups, challenged by a new government. It was subsequently upheldin October1991by which thecriminal also reinstated theIndianSupreme Court, charges 1989settlement. that werequashedbytheFebruary UnionCarbideto evade anymeaningful allowing Quite apartfrom for the world'sworstindustrial accountability havingperpetrated settlement unfortunate this is, on the face of it, totally disaster, of the victims. needs in the Indeed,itis noteven inadequate meeting of the sufficient to meetthe needs forhealthcare and monitoring to from estimated 200,000 500,000 gas-exposed population (variously needs have been persons); those health-careand monitoring estimated to cost at least $600 millionoverthe next conservatively
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World ina Transnational Disasters Industrial TheEthics of
were used for If the entire amount of the settlement thirty years.26 left forothervitalneeds therewouldbe nothing health-care monitoring, of the victims such as vocational rehabilitation, environmental sanitation,and decent housing,let alone cash compensation for all of theirpain and suffering. and emotional economicdeprivation, For all ofthephysicalsuffering, traumathatvictimshave experienced,theyhave soughtnot only cash housingand improved compensationbut also vocational rehabilitation, environmental and, perhaps above all else, adequate health sanitation, care. That theirneeds have been largelyignored foralmost a decade in India and of is the faultof local, state,and national governments claimed to have done much but in Union Carbide. The governments facthave done little.27 thatit was Carbide's pesticideplant that But it mustbe remembered in the firstplace and Carbide is, caused all of this human suffering Carbide's therefore, performancetoward the ultimately responsible. While claimingto have made has been cynicaland self-serving. victims numerousoffersto help the victimsthat were spurned by the Indian view thatCarbide's principal it ignoresthe government's government, offersalways came with unacceptable stringsattached, such as the on themedicalconditionsofthevictims insistenceon detailedreporting as a means of Carbide's acquiring evidence to use in its defense in the eventof a trialin the courts.
EvasionofAccountability
Carbide's behavior in puttingprofitconsiderationsahead of human led to this massive disaster, life and well-beingclearlyand inevitably and its behavior since the disasterhas been dedicated not to justice for its actions. Thus to those it harmed but to evading accountability in achievingthelatter farat least,ithas been all too successful objective. The Carbide management, once it realized the enormityof the disasterithad created,adopted a mode of "crisismanagement"focused to the corporation.Indeed, Carbide's response on "damage limitation" to the Bhopal disasterhas become the subjectof discussion and study at business schools at leading universitieswhere crisis management is considered to be an importantelement in the curriculumin the Carbide's performancein corporatemanagers.28 preparationof future disaster is wellworth industrial worst the world's with examining dealing in terms of the capacity of large corporations to evade serious accountabilityfor their actions when those actions are harmfulto others. Union Carbide's response to Bhopal has followedtwo interrelated
Ward Morehouse 485
tactics:delay and denial. The companyhas soughtto delay both ofrelief andjusticeto thevictims whilepostponing provision anylegal it.In themeantime, ithas mounted a vigorous judgments against public relations whichhas claimedmoralresponsibility forthe campaign, disaster whilesimultaneously ofresponsibility, denying anyother type such as liability or responsibility forthe actionsof its subsidiary. As indicated thecorporation has also attempted todeny that serious above, harmwascausedtothevictims.
ForumDodging:How CarbidePlacedItself theLaw Beyond
to avoid Carbideand itshigh-priced efforts lawyers began withtheir a USjurytrial theclaims over the and victims their survivors brought by behavior. forgrossly (Carbide,by its againstthe company negligent in theneighborhood has spent ownadmission, of$50 million on legal withBhopal.)29 In the Federal District fees in connection Courtin where NewYork, variousactionsbrought the bylawyers representing ofall ofthevictims claimants andbythegovernment ofIndiaon behalf wereconsolidated, the company werenot arguedthatthe US courts forthetrialand thatIndian courts werequiteable theproper forum todealwith suchmassive andcomplex chewed Thismaneuver litigation. more a and shifted the to India. than up year litigation Once thecase was in India,Union Carbideswitched itsargument. Itclaimed theIndiancourts wereno longer and the company's capable of due processwerebeingviolatedtimeand again. Virtually rights even on minor decisionof the trialcourt, matters, every procedural - not but even to Indian was appealed to the State Court the just High Court. With court the decision to the Supreme supreme uphold February and 1989settlement UnionCarbideas "full offinancial claimsagainst never it appearsthatthere willbe a trialto determine final," liability forthisterrible thatthe issue arisesin disaster, exceptto the extent ofCarbide, thecriminal itsIndiansubsidiary, andvarious prosecutions ifthosecharges are in fact tried. officials ofbothcompanies, The questionof due processprovedto be an extremely potent Damocles which Carbide andits ofIndianandUS lawyers sword, platoon used to tryto intimidate of the Indian courtsand the government Indiaas thesolelegalrepresentative in India.The Federal ofthevictims be sent District Courtin NewYork, whenordering thatthe litigation to India fortrial, that to Union Carbide must specified agree accept oftheIndian courts "minimal thejurisdiction requirements provided weremet.30 ofdue process" The US Court ofAppeals, towhich Carbide deleted the word court "minimal" district as the decision, appealed well as the requirement thatCarbidebe subject to US judicial rules
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of discovery in the Indian courts.31 Thus, Carbide was able to threaten at every turn in the Indian courts that its due process rightswere being violated and that,by refusingto obey Indian court orders,it would force the governmentof India to chase it back into the US courts in order to compel it to obey those orders,therebyusing up large additional chunksof time. Fromthe beginning,thiswas a keyelementin the Carbide strategy: followedby asbestos to outlastthe victims.This is the same strategy - a lesson not manufacturers and insurance companies since the 1950s wasted on Union Carbide. (In fact,Union Carbide followeda similar tactic in the 1930s in the Hawk's Nest tragedy,which has been industrial disasterin the UnitedStates.)32 characterizedas the worst The Bhopal DistrictCourt, recognizingthe inherentinjusticeof a legal battlein whichone partywithdeep pocketscan outlastthe other, reliefof $270 million. interim orderedUnion Carbide to pay substantive Carbide the court's interimrelief order. refused to Predictably, obey It appealed that order to the Madhya Pradesh High Court.When the the companyrefused upheld the lowercourtruling, high courtin effect to obey the orderyetagain, appealing thistimeto the Indian Supreme Court. This appeals process used up more than a year of additional time.It was, in fact,the appeal of the lower court orders on payment reliefthatthe supremecourtwas hearingwhen it "ordered" of interim the February1989settlement.
or Vidimizer Union Carbideas Victim
As if these maneuvers were not enough to evade some meaningful for the world's "moral responsibility" fulfillment of its often-claimed Union Carbide engaged in another deceitful worstindustrialdisaster, maneuver by claiming that the gas leak fromits pesticide plant was caused by"sabotage" bya disgruntled employee.It has neveridentified that employee,although it claims to know who he is. In any event, its Indian subsidiaryhas now admittedthat the sabotage theorywas false,arguinginsteadthatthreeemployeescaused the disasterthrough behavior.33 negligent But as a public relations ploy,the sabotage theorywas admirable, for it enabled Carbide's management to argue that it was not the victimizer butthevictim. This tacticis notunknownamongcorporations or governmentagencies engaging in reckless behavior that causes the blame is laid on a worker widespread harm. All too frequently, as Carbide continuesto do in thiscase. or workers,
Ward Morehouse 487 Bhopaland Corporate Irresponsibility
With oftheFebruary 1989settlement, theupholding anyfurther legal actionin theIndianor US courts to be foreclosed, appears effectively 1991 reinstated for thecriminal bytheOctober supreme charges except court decision. With thatpossibleexception, Carbideappearsto have forthe world's worstindustrial evaded its responsibility effectively As we have seen, the amountof the settlement is totally disaster. of to meet the needs let alone victims. future, existing, inadequate in It is trivial to or court awards other settlements compared major industrial disasters, given the huge numberof dead and injured. of $470 millionoffered to morethan 600,000. Comparethe figure in the Bhopal tragedy claimants withthe $2.5 billionoffered by the Manville for some claims of caused 60,000 injury Corporation Johns by exposureto asbestos(an amountmanythinkto be far shortof the$2.48 billionfundcreated thatneededto help future victims); by A. H. Robinsto settle claims to DalkonShieldinjuries 195,000 relating tobe farbelowneededamounts); orthe$108million (likewise thought the MonsantoCompany was orderedto pay the family of a single chemical worker whodiedofleukemia due tobenzeneexposure. in relation is theamount oftheFebruary settlement howtrivial Just to Carbide's resources and capacity in thereaction to payis reflected oftheNewYork wasannounced. Stock thedaythesettlement Exchange Carbide'sstockpricerose $2.00 a share! All of the amountexcept and small some$20 million wascovered insurance byCarbide's liability amounts it had set aside each yearwhilethe litigation on.34 dragged to with able The company's was thus announce, apparent management thatitsstrategy and thatthe of containment had worked satisfaction, adverse on thecompany's settlement would haveno significantly impact finances.35 The remaining cost of the settlement was in factmetby - a yearin which in 1988 a 43 centpersharecharge dividends against Carbidehad record of million. profits $662 The PlightoftheVictims Not onlyare gas-exposed victims to die at a rapid rate, continuing but morbidity ratesare rising, to studies conducted by the according Indian Councilof MedicalResearch(ICMR). The medicalevidence accumulates on theincreasingly and multiple health serious long-term of MIC on humanbeings.It is yetanothermeasureof the effects ofUnionCarbide's behavior inthis disaster that thecompany immorality shouldhavebeen usingsucha deadlychemical forwhich thehuman
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The Ethics ina Transnational Industrial Disasters World of
is simplyunknown.At least that is the situationif we are to toxicity believe Carbide, which keeps insistingthat it has released all of the information it has on the toxiceffects of MIC.36 MIC and itsreactionproducts, whichescaped from the Carbide plant on thatfateful adverse nightin December 1984,have had a particularly effect on the lungs of the victims. One studyindicatesthat98 percent of the gas-exposed population (whichitselfnumbersbetween 500,000 and 600,000) was found to be having difficult or labored respiration afterexertion.This is a particularly criticalimpairment fora universe of individuals who earned meager wages primarilythrough hard physicallabor. Many of them are no longer able to do the workthey did before the disaster,and very few have any other less physically demanding alternative. Recurrent respiratoryinfections afflict 73 percent,chest pains plague 42 percent, and 24 percent of the gasaffected population have Reactive Airway Dysfunction Syndrome in thecontrol (RADS). Bycontrast, populationused in theICMR studies, such symptoms were foundin only2 percentof the population. But the lungs are not the onlyvitalorgan affected. The liver, spleen, and kidneyshave also shown adverse effects. And althoughtherewere ifany,cases ofblindnessfrom theCarbide few, exposureto thegas from plant during and rightafterthe disaster,almost a decade later there is a farhigherincidence of cataractsthan in a comparable population. Yet other adverse effectsof the gases to which the people of Bhopal were exposed are a miscarriagerate more than twicethatof a control population of comparable socioeconomic status and a much higher rate of stillbirths. There is also widespread evidence of damage to women'sreproductive organs. At least as dismayingas the foregoingare overall morbidity trends among the gas-affectedpeople of Bhopal. According to the ICMR increased from15 percent in May-November1987 studies,morbidity to more than 30 percent in November 1989-March 1990. All of this miseryhas been visited on persons whose sin was to live downwind of a pesticideplantthatwas designed and operatedbyan irresponsible drivenby the imperative to maximizeprofits and corporateenterprise minimize losses at the expense of the well-being, of indeed survival, in whichtheplantwas located.37 the community If morality, as specified in its dictionarydefinition, is behavior that "conformsto rightideals or principlesof human conduct,"then surely Union Carbide's behavior towardthe Bhopal victims was and is immoral. As if having to cope with the immoralbehavior of Union Carbide were not enough, these trulyinnocent victimshave had to deal as well withbehavior thatis qualitatively no betterat the hands of local That storyis beyond the scope of this paper,but suffice government.
Ward Morehouse 489
of interim health-care itto saythattheadministration services, relief, of claims for personalinjuriesor and the reviewand processing have been characterized the gas-leak disaster economiclosses from of the fundamental abuse and rights bribery, apathy, by corruption, and as of India's citizensas set forthin the Indian constitution thevictims' law.(Of course, humanrights in international recognized Union in thefirst instance were violated humanrights Carbide.) by of an As the People'sUnion forCivil Libertiessaid in a report "antiPradesh the into government's Madhya investigation had been "revictimized" in 1990-1991, thevictims drive" encroachment Itis noconsolation housesdemolished).38 their context (inthis byhaving thatsuchrevictimization of thisdisaster to thevictims appearsto be disasters. industrial of other victims common large-scale among quite it is to thissad tale of immorality, feature If thereis anyredeeming to and to resist of someof thevictims the determination oppression in spite of their continueto demandjustice and accountability, in this continuing disabilities. leadership By far the mostvigorous of victims women the come from has Bhopal.39 struggle Institution in an Immoral "MoralResponsibility that Union Carbideinsisted from the timeof the disaster, Virtually industrial worst the world's for "moral it accepted responsibility" oftheBhopal account disaster. Indeed,ifDan Kurzman's journalistic wentto Anderson Warren be at face is to taken value, catastrophe moved the after disaster, by a sense genuinely Bhopal immediately as much as a desire to and of compassion help possibleas provide thathis company the vast to alleviate as possible suffering quickly ill-fated had causedin that city.40 sense of compassionmay have animatedWarren But whatever soon took realities harsher to thedisaster, initial Anderson's response and a settlement arrive at to efforts in its command. Rebuffed early a scale on and claims for with confronted suffering pain, injury, Union Carbideand of the disaster, with the enormity commensurate becameconsumed who dealtwith theBhopal tragedy itstop officials to whileit sought due processrights the company's withdefending the of as would be as that settlement a protective possible negotiate and itsshareholders. ofthecompany interests withRobert based on a briefpersonalencounter My impression, and chief executive chairman successor as Anderson's Warren Kennedy, in 1986at the age of 65), retired officer ofUnionCarbide(Anderson is that in Danbury, at the 1988Carbideannual meeting Connecticut,
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the Carbide senior management saw the problem by that time as essentiallya commercialtransactionin which a price was negotiated, the price then paid, and the matterclosed. There remains a vast gulf between,on theone hand, Carbide's perceptionsofthevalue of human life in India, the extent of death and personal injury,and the cost of dealing with these phenomena, and, on the other hand, the with expectationsof the victimsthemselves, voluntary groupsworking the victims, and Indian government officials. But nowherehave I been able to discern in the company'scalculus a recognitionof the victims' demand formeaningful on the part of those who have accountability theirlives and caused themsuch anguish. destroyed In fact, some observers of the behavior of large industrial corporationssuch as Union Carbide would argue that,whatevermay have been Anderson'sinitialimpulses,the companymanagementhad no alternative but to behave in this manner.Had theybeen genuinely and made trulydisinterested offersof help on a scale forthcoming to themagnitudeofthedisaster, wouldalmostcertainly appropriate they have been confronted with suits by shareholdersseeking to hold the management accountable for mishandlingcompany funds,which,at least theoretically, are the collectiveproperty of the shareholders.To the extent that such circumstanceseffectively constrain the actions of senior officials of large corporationsin dealing withmass industrial the assertionthatthese institutions behave immorally toward disasters, theirvictims becomes all the more apparent.41 Carbide's problems in coping with the Bhopal disaster appear to have been compounded by the company's own internal culture.An effort to describe this social realityhas been made by Dan Kurzman in his book, which,however, carries the storyonly up until late 1986, and by Wil Lepkowski,senior editor of the Chemical and Engineering News,in various articles in thatjournal as well as in a chapter in a book being edited by Sheila Jasanofat Cornell University. forthcoming and itsrole in Bhopal Lepkowskisums up Carbide's perceptionof itself in these words: A compassionate victimized ata plant company, byemployee sabotage it did notcontrol milesaway;a company thatdid everything 10,000 tobring succor andjustcompensation tothevictims ofBhopal possible at to be Indian and activist only hampered every pointby politics thatfinally a company settlement assaults; agreedto a $470million farin excessoftheactualneedsofvictims.42 for Lepkowskihas thisto say about Carbide's "moral responsibility"
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the Bhopal tragedy,which it transmuted into "a sense of self righteousness": even Carbide becamemoralistic, Instead ofbeing morally responsible, close-minded aboutBhopal.To Carbide, thesettlement wasa closure from atonement that allowed ittowalk India,to evadethefuller away been the that moral responsibility could have implies.Bhopal innovation: to display for UnionCarbide legaland moral opportunity A disaster one company decided not to turnits back on. Instead, to continuing at Bhopal, it negotiated notcommitment stewardship even antiquarian, of its moral but an uncreative, way notarizing what was(and is) a unique, for ongoing tragedy. responsibility at Washington's In the summer a longinterview of 1989, during Club and laterin his office, I asked RonaldWishart Metropolitan timesafter involvedat different [a Union Carbide vice-president relations and publicrelations] whether Bhopal in US government to atonement forBhopal. Carbideboreanylongterm responsibility in a World driver The answer WarII ambulance givenbyWishart, that atonement church was India and a former elder, Presbyterian which Carbidenever intended to admit.43 guilt, implied Reflectiveof this corporate culture and the paranoid behavior it engenders is the celebrated case of the internal Carbide memo on an environmental activist organization known as the Citizens Clearinghouse for Hazardous Waste (CCHW). That memorandum describedCCHW as "one ofthe mostradical coalitionsoperatingunder banner" with"tiesintolabor,thecommunist theenvironmentalist party, and all mannerof folkwithprivate/single agendas."44 This matchesmyown experience in dealing withCarbide, including in mypresence uttered red-baiting epithetsof "ideological extremism" In our and counsel. Carbide's chief book, Abuseof by vice-president whichdetails Carbide's sordid health,safety, and environmental Power, we describe several instances recordover three-quarters of a century, ofsuspectedattempts Carbide to muzzle itscritics. One such incident by is not suspected but known to have occurred: an effort by a member of Union Carbide's board of directors to persuade RobertAbrams,New York State attorneygeneral, not to appear at a news conference in New YorkCityin April 1989witha delegationof Bhopal victims touring the United States to protestthe February 1989 settlementbetween of India.45 Carbide and the government Carbide's angry denunciation of Abuseof Poweris itselfa further on the book distributed at Carbide's 1990 case in point.The statement annual meetingasserts:
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So it[the bookAbuse Power] pageafter page.UnionCarbide of goesfor inprotecting ispictured as callously uninterested its thepublic workers, ortheenvironment. Union that Carbide Wereject charge categorically. is a leaderin itssafety and environmental We can accept programs. no lessa position. The company statement then goes on to imputeto us as authorsthe mostevil of ideological heresiesby concluding: Whatreallyseemsto be the aim of the book is the dissolution of US corporations withaffiliates and subsidiaries aroundthe globe. and services. Wesee no evilin providing Itis regrettable jobs,products thatdiatribes suchas Abuse Power seek to evil of impute to our free world economic system.46 of the situationis significant The issue of the transnational character for our hypothesis.We do know that the safetysystemsat Carbide's Bhopal plant (let alone the manner in which the plant was operated, withthe apparent knowledgeand implicitapproval of the US parent company) were substantiallyinferiorto correspondingfacilities in West Virginia. We also know,from Bhopal's sisterplant in Institute, Carbide's calculations of the value of life in India, that they put a muchlowerpricetag on lives in India than those in the UnitedStates.47 But Carbide's behavior has not been much different towardvictims of its industrialdisastersin the United States. Consider,for example, itsresponse in the Hawk'sNesttunneldisaster, anotherfirst forCarbide considered the worst in industrial disaster the United States), (generally and compare it with Carbide's response in Bhopal, even though the twodisastersare separated by half a century: from theplaintiffs' UnionCarbideobtained to all documents rights as partoftheout-of-court settlement attorneys including agreement, of men who died. They are stillthe only on the number figures Estimates on thedeathtollofworkers. oneswith anyaccurate figures from 65 the President of Rinehart & Dennis) (the range given by figure to 2,000 (an opinion givenby SenatorHolt at the Congressional in 1936). ... Hearings a The settlement forthe Hawk'sNesttunnel workers constituted for Carbide's behavior in awful an even more disaster. grim precedent of The case was settled out-of-court at about 3 percent ($130,000) and thatmeageramounthad to the $4 millionoriginally sought, and their be divided between theclaimants attorneys. in theworld's claims UnionCarbidesettled worst In February 1989, industrial disaster out-of-court with the Indian government
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ofwhat a fraction for$470million, theBhopalvictims representing and notenough wasoriginally ($3 billion), bythegovernment sought healthneeds,muchless provide to coverthevictims' compensation. outlitigation wasabletodrag AsintheHawk's Nest cases,thecompany their of thevictims whodied awaiting untilitwas too late formany in both instances, Carbideeffectively "day in court."Apparently, intosettling sums. victims for trivial theremaining blackmailed Many victims atHawk's Nestand atBhopal ofthenamesofUnionCarbide's shall not and thoughit is hoped that"they will neverbe known, that workers as a reminder havedied in vain,"thecompany persists of such at the hands be continue to and communities may exploited corporations.48 irresponsible In spite of Carbide's efforts to cover up the Hawk's Nest disaster, much of the storyof that grim tragedyhas been pieced togetherby and Martin Cherniack in a doctoral dissertationat Yale University book.49 in a documented has been meticulously published subsequently of the Hawk's Nest disasterin our book AbuseofPower Our treatment drewCarbide's ire, showingthat,even aftermore than half a century, allegations feelingsof guiltpersist.In one of several false or distorted about the contentof our book- presented in Carbide's statementas - Carbide stated: "errors" on a tunneling forworker The authors claimthatdisregard safety deathsfrom in in to so the 1930's led West many Virginia project silicosisthattheywere buried in mass graves.The construction didthework some5,000peopleover that actually employed company in some Therewere19 deathsattributed the length of the project. no mass There were to silicosis. graves.50 certainly way Drawingupon congressionalhearingsinto the incidentin 1936 and whatwe actuallysaid was: a 1975articlein The Washington Monthly, theirdeath, workers wouldbe buriedjust hoursafter Sometimes In most so that an autopsy couldnotbe performed. cases, presumably whose wascitedas thecause ofdeath.One blackwoman pneumonia his death,had his body husbandwas buried just a fewhoursafter on topofhim. menstacked other Therewerethree exhumed. thatthe company admitted The undertaker, paid HadleyWhite, twicethe normalrate,but said he had only him $55 per person, on hisfarm.51 buried 33 persons The reader will find no referenceto "mass graves." In this passage made and elsewherein our chapteron Hawk'sNest,we describe efforts
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or to coverup silicosisas the real cause of death,withpneumonia witnesses and medical doctors cited often tuberculosis being bycompany a figure ofnineteen ThatCarbideasserted bythecompany. employed even if it is an incorrect to silicosis, deathsattributed (as it figure of this have records that almost is), suggests they tragic kept certainly andwedo agree matter Carbide ofBhopal.On onefactual forerunner numbered around force on the tunnel work that thetotal 5,000 project persons.
Remedies forand Preventionof Immoral Behavior
needed to testthe to thispointis all thatis really The presentation that ofthispaper central (and largeindustrial corporations hypothesis such as government doubtless otherlarge institutions bodies) treat and victims of industrial disasters despitetheirrhetoric immorally, moral But anyonewhose evasiveactionsto the contrary. indignation willwantto consider tale of immorality is arousedby thisshameful behaviorso as to whether thereare anywaysof changing corporate to their victims. enhanceaccountability toutedby Carbide and other (presently self-regulation Industry manufacturers totheBhopal US chemical as industry's response leading thusfarto be no morethan in the form of whatis proving disaster of Care Program a publicrelations ployknownas the Responsible and government Manufacturer's theChemical Association) regulation If they wouldnot have been 6,982accidents do notwork. did,there of industrial releasesbeyond the perimeters toxicchemical involving overa fiveplantsin the UnitedStatesalone thatweredocumented Protection forthe US Environmental yearperiod in a recentstudy - accidents more than135peopleand injured killed that nearly Agency l,500.52 and measures thatwouldhelp assuregreater accountability Among aresuchinitiatives diminish theintensity behavior ofimmoral perhaps and community hazard indemnity as worker funds, comprehensive clearand ofhazardous and environmental evaluation health products, communities workers and for enforceable surrounding rights readily on in those to know facilities whatis really industrial hazardous going down the of the extent to facilities and to act(even operation shutting if theyare being run in a carelessand negligent of such facilities Other forcorporate sanctions and criminal accountability. manner), where absolute or include strict especially liability legal strategies for multinational facilities are involved, hazardous enterprise liability
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andjointventures, and ground rulesthat theactsofsubsidiaries specify events. forum for the transboundary involving litigation judicial and couldincludepubliceducation campaigns strategies Extra-legal of or even direct as when the residents consumer action, boycotts, new chemical in Thailandburnedand effectively a Phuket destroyed Bank their entreaties to theWorld plantaboutto open after repeated and otheragenciesto keep the plantout of theircommunity were that the time has come to We also argue recognizethat ignored. at are least multinational (MNCs) fully coequal to nationcorporations in statesin powerand resources. fifteen (The largestcorporations thanthe grossdomestic theworldtodayhave grossincomesgreater MNCs should of morethan 120 countries!) At a minimum, products standards as national human tothesameinternational be subject rights a we have before to travel vast distance clearly although governments, it can be said thatthe basic humanrights of hundreds of millions are adequately ofpeoplein theworld and violators ofthose protected and punished. rights promptly meaningfully is the task of establishing using accountability Justhow difficult mechanisms intheonly is reflected existing remaining hopetheBhopal to victims have of some smallmeasureofjusticeand accountability UnionCarbideforall of the pain and suffering Carbidehas caused them.This hope involves the criminal chargesthatwerereinstated in the Indian Court its October 1991 which decision, by Supreme upheld that never shouldhave financial theunjust 1989 settlement February - pleabargaining beenquashedinthefirst Indiancriminal under place law is not permitted forseriouschargessuch as culpablehomicide, it is in theUnited eventhough A courageous States. judge in Bhopal, in Delhi, ChiefMagistrate Gulab Sharma,and a resolute prosecutor in India'sCentral a jointdirector K.Madhavan, BureauofInvestigation, But Madhavanhas since weremoving forward withdetermination. in his taken earlyretirement, with disgusted politicalinterference involved of another celebrated case that by allegedbribery handling the Swedisharmsmanufacturer Boforsat the highest levelsof the The trialhas been reassigned Indiangovernment. to another Bhopal Sessions Courtjudge, WajahatAli Shah, and the outlookis again uncertain.53 In the meantime, Union Carbideinsists thatit,in the wordsof its and counsel, vice-president general JosephE. Goeghan,"has never oftheIndiancourts."54 criminal law to submit to the agreed jurisdiction Thatstatement is factually as I pointed outto Goeghanand incorrect, hissuperior, chairman and chief executive Robert the current Kennedy, of UnionCarbide, officer in April1992. at Carbide'sannual meeting Carbidespecifically to thejurisdiction ofthecourts agreed"to submit
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of India" in the May 12, 1986, decision of JudgeJohn F. Keenan in the Federal DistrictCourt in New York, in which Keenan granted Carbide's motion fordismissal of the litigationagainst it fordamages in US courtsand its transfer back to India. The reader will note that there was no limitationin that agreement to civil law jurisdiction. Carbide was aware that criminal charges were involved Furthermore, as earlyas December 7,1984,when,accordingto Dan Kurzman,Warren Andersonwas presentedwitha listof the charges being made against Carbide, its Indian subsidiary, and officials of both companies (includingAndersonhimself).55 in raisingsuch a question,I was treated For mytroubles to an indigant lectureby Goeghan, in which he asserted that US corporations and their officialsare never subject to the criminaljurisdiction of other countries under "internationallaw" and that the only courts whose criminaljurisdiction he would recognize were US courts. Goeghan's answer is, of course, wrongon several counts. Reciprocity is a basic can try Manuel law.If theUS government principleunderinternational Noriega in a criminalcourt in the United States for actions taken on to see why WarrenAnderson and Union foreignsoil, it is difficult Carbide (corporations are considered legal persons under US law) cannot be tried in India on criminal charges of culpable homicide. the US government arrestedhim in (In Noriega's case, furthermore, Panama and broughthim forcibly to the United States to stand trial. India thus far has talked only about initiating extradition proceedings to getWarrenAndersonto come to India.) My colleague, Clarence Dias, presidentof the Center for Law and Development and an international human rights lawyer, notes is partof the settlement that"the criminaltrialrestitution additionally You can't and aside all the others."56 take one leave package. portion Nonetheless,it is clear that Carbide intendsto take a hard line on criminalcharges,almost certainly compellingthe Indian prosecution to chase themback into the US courtsin orderto get themto submit if indeed the US courts will order them to do so. Thus additional will die, and more lawyers will earn huge yearswill pass, morevictims fees before there is even a possibilitythat Carbide mightbe held accountable foritsrole in thistragicindustrialdisaster. Of course, the problemsof the Bhopal victimsare compounded by the circumstance voiceless. thattheyare almostall poor and therefore It appears thatthesocioeconomicstatusofvictims disasters ofindustrial has a bearing on the degree, if not the kind, of behavior corporate of these disastersexhibittowardthem.Only a few of the perpetrators survivors of Bhopal victimshave received even meager compensation fromthe Carbide settlement money.(Some victimsand theirsurvivors
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for thelastthree havebeen receiving "interim evenmore years meager from relief of Rs. 200,or aboutUS$7 a month, initially government of India funds,and morerecently out of interest on the Carbide hundred ofall ofthethree settlement therelatives money.) Bycontrast, of theJune23, 1984,Air India crash off victims or so middle-class with ofnearly were thecoastofIreland compensation speedily provided at current Rs. 1 million each.57 (aboutUS$35,000 rates) exchange
Toward a New Ethics and Politics of Corporate Accountability
worst industrial The larger question posed bythissaga of theworld's disaster is howwe go aboutmaking multinational (and corporations other large institutions such as governments and international that is, how do we make them truly agencies) behave ethically; affected accountable to thosewhose livesare mostdirectly by their of of course,norwilllimitations actions? There is no singleanswer, a full-blown to this me to articulate question. response space permit ofthat can be sketched. Butat leastsomebasiccontours response mustbegin with The struggle for real corporateaccountability of for and communities risk bearers workers empowerment example, Union Carbide hazardous facilities like the plant in surrounding at the and that means effective mobilization political Bhopal of some measure the Indeed, grassroots. Bhopal tragedy provides of thisproposition. of the The littlepositive affirmation treatment the victims thathas occurred has comeaboutalmost entirely through in of victims which at times became disorderly engaging politics protest, as thevictims, wereruthlessly attacked women, bythepolice. especially Butnonetheless occasionalresults ofwhich wereachieved, byfarthe advanced as a demand mostnotableis interim relief, by originally victim before which wouldhavetried theBhopalDistrict Court, groups had been held. thecase ofcivildamages Carbideifa trial against mobilization But grass-roots and are onlya organization political of the the foundation on albeit which all else rests. part challenge, links in of such mobilization are Critically important support solidarity is and Here the case nationally internationally. again, Bhopal were able it can these links be said that instructive, although hardly the concentration to overcome of corporate and government power withwhichtheywere confronted. at different times, Nonetheless, in earlier the India's within especially stages, Bhopal support groups in Delhi,played an important as does, sector, part, especially voluntary and Action.And to this day,the Bhopal Group for Information international linkshave been cultivated a variety of means, through
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such as the International Secretariatsof Trade Unions, which sent a trade union delegation to Bhopal in 1985 to conduct their own of the disaster,and, until the present,the International investigation in Bhopal, a network Coalition for ofseven organizationsaround Justice theworldcampaigningin supportofthe demands oftheBhopal victims for justice and accountability. in formulating new But we need to look beyond this kind of effort standards of ethical behavior and creatinginstitutional mechanisms that will assure that these standards are observed and provide for is the easy part,and a significant punitiveaction.The standardssetting beginning has been made throughthe workof three sessions of the of three PermanentPeople's Tribunal,whichhas led to the formulation charters of rights of victims,of communities,and of workers in The final session of the Tribunal on Industrial hazardous industries. and EnvironmentalHazards and Human Rights,which is scheduled into a single forLondon in late 1994,will seek to codifythese charters instrumenton rights of victims,of communities,and workersand of governments and corporations.58 responsibilities Parallel efforts to formulatestandardsof ethical behavior are also momentum. forexample,thearticulation of"ethical Consider, gathering Robert which has led in priorities" large-scale developmentprojects, insist that to Goodland of the WorldBank's Environment Department In "selection of any but the least damaging project is unethical."59 a similar vein, Communities Concerned About Corporations,a USand religiousinvestors, ofworkers, based network victims, communities, to formulatestandards of "ethical production,"especially is striving to in the petrochemicalindustry, as one element in a larger strategy curb corporate power and make it more accountable to those most affected bywhatcorporationsdo.60 directly The real challenge lies in developingeffective techniques to assure that these standards are actually met, and when they are not, that held to account. We should and meaningfully violatorsare promptly have no illusions that this challenge will be met easily,but we must keep beforeus thathomelywisdomthata journey of a thousand miles begins with a but single step. And there are some of those "single in theform ofcampaignstore-assert "people's steps"occurring, typically that the over increasingly sovereignty" huge global corporations dominatethe global politicaleconomy.Some verytentative steps were made at the recent World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna toward an international criminal court, whereas others have been crimes and an arguingfor an internationalcourt for environmental of regional courts)to whichvictims internationalcourt (and a system violationscould appeal directly. of human rights
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In the meantime,citizen tribunalssuch as the PermanentPeople's Tribunal or the International People's Tribunal on the G-7,which oftheGroupofSeven majorindustrialized issued an indictment recently nations in Tokyo,present alternativemechanisms for those who are to presenttheircases.61 ofimmoral behaviorbylarge institutions victims in thisdirectionis the campaign now being Yetanothersmall initiative once again undertake launched to insistthattheUnitedNations system multinational of of the behavior monitoring corporations but in a manner much more effective than the work of its Centre for TransnationalCorporationsin the past. Yet another approach, at least in the United States, is to address ofcorporateenterprises whenthey theimmorality injureor killinnocent victimsat a still more fundamentallevel. Among those engaged in activistand environmental this task is RichardGrossman,a long-time entitledFear authorof a classic workon job blackmail in US industry, of the He has argued that we must reassertthe sovereignty At Work. fallen into the has which over "social increasingly property," people - namely decisions on exclusive domain of corporatedecisionmaking and the organizationof work.The instrument investment, production, forachievingthis goal, he believes, is throughthe corporatecharters, in the United States,were seen as licenses which,at least historically of people for some identifiablepublic the state on behalf given by This means challengingcorporate power at its vital center. purpose. FrankAdams,sum up theirargument Grossmanand his fellowworker, in these words: ifwe haven't we need to ask one another spentenoughtime, Today, with these and intentionallymoney niggling well-guarded, energy Don't we harm insulatedcorporations. constructed, meticulously ofcorporate andtheEarth when weletthevery realmonster ourselves of active law block our paths? Don't we demean the tradition be our Wouldn't it when we liberating away? citizenship give rights ourcivic and exhilarating to reclaim rights? forcharters we the criteria We can start, stateby state, bylisting we can insist willallowto be issued.Then,armedwith our criteria, of everycorporation that thatelectedofficials revokethe charter Ifourelected fails toagreeinwriting toourstandards. representatives to will not cooperate, we can vote themout of officeor petition In thefuture, to do businessin our recallthem. anyonewhowants withtheir states must first cometo thepeople directly plan forthe of work, resource and technology, use, products along organization with and communities.62 therights ofworkers of course, moral behavior is heavilyinfluenced by the Ultimately,
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and social relationships. distribution of power in human institutions to bring about an outcome And this is preciselywhy it is so difficult fromthatwhichhas occurred,at least thus far,in the world's different worstindustrialdisaster as well as hundreds of others all over the overthepastcentury worldthathave occurredwithdismaying regularity So until we reach a Utopian stage of human evolution in or more.63 which power is less heavily concentratedin the hands of corporate of industrialdisasters,we must be prepared and other perpetrators to continue resistance against the immoral behavior of these large and ponder the words,slightly and powerfulinstitutions paraphrased, of people againstpower of Czech authorMilan Kundera: "The struggle of memory is a struggle againstforgetting."64 of the world'sworstindustrialdisastercan neverforget. The victims We mustnot either.
Notes
NewInternational are takenfromWebster's 1. Dictionary definitions Dictionary, Mass.: G & C Merriam,1959). Second edition (Springfield, 2. Based on testimony presented to the Permanent People's Tribunal on Industrial and EnvironmentalHazards and Human Rights,Yale University Law School, April 1991.See also the reportof the Independent Commission on the Narmada Projectby BradfordMorse and Thomas Berger(Washington, D.C.: WorldBank, 1992). 3. PermanentPeople's Tribunal on Industrialand EnvironmentalHazards Third andJudgements: and Human Rights, Session, Bhopal and Bombay, Findings October 19-24,1992. 4. Ibid., p. 25. See also Ward Morehouse, "Bittersweet Justice:Permanent (Madras),January1,1993. People's Tribunal,"Frontline 5. The Trade UnionReporton Bhopal (Geneva and Brussels: International ofFree Trade Unions and InternationalFederationofChemical, Confederation and General Workers' Unions,July1985). This section on the Genesis Energy, of the Bhopal disaster is adapted from Ward Morehouse and M. Arun WhatReallyHappenedand WhatIt Means Subramaniam, The Bhopal Tragedy: and Communities at Risk(NewYork:Council on International Workers forAmerican and Public Affairs, 1986),pp. 2-3. 6. Morehouse and Subramaniam, note 5, pp. 24-25; "Furor Over Selling of Lives Cheap," The Hindu, February 26, 1989. One method of estimating deaths is based on the number of death shrouds sold in Bhopal in the days the catastrophe(7,000by one count). A senior UNICEF following immediately conditions in Bhopal shortlyafterthe official,aftera week of investigating disaster,commented that many doctors and other health officialsprivately reportedto him thattheybelieved the death tollwas around 10,000. The remainder of this section is adapted from David Dembo, Ward Morehouse, and Lucinda Wykle; Abuse of Power: Social Performance of TheCase ofUnionCarbide Multinational (New York:New Horizons Corporations: Press, 1990), chapter10. For a perceptiveexamination of the tragedyand the
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it generated, the perceptions of thevictims themselves, including responses of a Disaster," Alternatives see ShivVisvanathan, "Bhopal: The Imagination XI (1986):147-165. ofthedisaster Detailed accounts in a number aregiven itself Morehouse andSubramaniam, ofdifferent note5,especially sources, including chapter1 ("WhatHappened at Bhopal") and chapter2 ("The Impactof of a Tragedy," Shankar Varma, "Bhopal:The Unfolding Bhopal");and Vijaya XI (1986):133-145. Alternatives 7. EdwardMunoz,Affidavit, US District Southern 24, 1985, Court, January District ofNewYork, MDL626. 8. The TradeUnionReport on Bhopal,note 5, "Methyl Isocyanate:The of a Hazard,"Chemical and Engineering News, 11,1985, Chemistry February p. 32. 9. Ibid.,p. 9. October 10. UnionCarbide, ManualPartI: Methyl Unit, Isocyanate Operating 1978. is not designedto 11.According to the plantmanager, "The flaretower buta smallquantity handleanything of MIC suchas perhapsa fewhundred "PlantDesign BadlyFlawed,"Times litres an hour."Praful Bidwai, ofIndia 1984). (December and C. S. Tyson, 13. See, forexample, L. A. Kail, "Operational J.J.Poulson, UnionCarbideIndia Ltd.BhopalPlant," CO/MIC/Sevin Units, Survey, Safety and UnionCarbide, note10. May1982; and Subramaniam, 14. See discussion note on siting ofplantin Morehouse 5,p. 3.
15. The TradeUnionReport on Bhopal,note 5, p. 9. on Bhopal,note 5, p. 9. 12. The TradeUnionReport
16. Ibid.,p. 8. 17.UnionCarbide, note10,p. 81.
19.Ibid.,p. 10. 20. Ibid. and Tyson, note13. 21. Kail,Paulson, MIC UnitInstitute 22. UnionCarbide, Safety/Health Survey "Operational Plant."Survey dates:July date: September 13, 1984;report 10, 1984; 9-July "Union and actionplan date: October10, 1984.Citedin PhilipShabecoff, CarbideHad Been Told of Leak Danger, NewYork Times, 25, 1985; January "UnionCarbideMovedtoBarAccident andRonWinslow, atU. S. PlantBefore Wall Street 28,1985. BhopalTragedy," Journal, January A KillingWind:InsideUnionCarbide and theBhopal 23. Dan Kurzman, McGraw-Hill, (NewYork: 1987). Catastrophe M. KerrMuir, V Mehra,and A. G. Salmon,"Exposure 24. N. Anderson, and Responseto Methyl Results of a Community Based Survey Isocyanate: Shobha Goyle,B. J. Phillips, A. Tee, et al., "Effects of Methyl Anderson, on RatMuscle Cellsin Culture," British Medicine Industrial Isocyanate Journal of 45(1988): WilLepkowski, Studies Point toSystemic 269-274; "Methyl Isocyanate: India Chemical andEngineering Effects," News, June13,1988;"BhopalDisaster: Publishes MedicalData," Chemical and Engineering November 30, 1987; News, "Toxins in Gas Victims' Anil Present Bodies,"Times 28,1987; ofIndia,October
A Preliminary from Sadgopal and SujitK Das, extracts Report ofConcern Regarding in the BodiesofBhopal Gas Victims, Persistence submitted to the Supreme ofToxins in Bhopal," British Journal of IndustrialMedicine45 (1988): 469-475; Diana
18. The TradeUnionReport on Bhopal,note 5, p. 9.
502
The EthicsofIndustrialDisastersin a Transnational World
Court of India on October 26, 1987;"MethylIsocyanate Tests: New Evidence ofLastingLung Damage," Chemical and Engineering March3, 1986;"Among News, Seriously AffectedMutagenesis Changes Not Ruled Out," Madhya Pradesh FlawsAre Found at Bhopal," Chronicle, February22, 1986;and "Immune System New York October 30, 1985. Times, 25. "BritishTV RevisitsBhopal," Chemical Week, July27,1988. 26. Citizens Commission on Bhopal, "A Program for the Compensation, Restitution and Rehabilitationof the Bhopal Victims," December 1985. of the victims'plightwas produced as 27. One of the betterinvestigations a documentary bythe BritishGranada TV program"Worldin Action,"entitled End," August1988. "Bhopal- TragedyWithout set up bya faculty member 28. One example is the IndustrialCrisis Institute from theSchool ofManagementat NewYorkUniversity. A conferenceorganized in 1986included WarrenAndersonas one of the speakers. by the institute of Union Carbide Annual Meeting, 29. Transcript April22, 1987, p. 38. 30. Order of ludtre lohn F. Keenan, May 12, 1986,p. 63. 31. US CourtofAppeals forthe Second Circuit, Decision on Appela,January 14, 1987. Industrial 32. Martin Cherniack, The Hawk's Nest Incident:AmericasWorst Disaster Press,1986). (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University 33. "Carbide Comes Up WithNew Theoryin Bhopal Case," Pioneer, February 27,1993. 34. "Union Carbide Agrees to SettleAll Bhopal Litigationfor$470 million," WallStreet Journal, February15, 1989. 35. Union Carbide Annual Report,1988,p. 49. 36. Rajiv Locham, "Health Damage Due to Bhopal Gas Disaster: Review of Medical Research," Economic and PoliticalWeekly, May 25, 1991,pp. 1322information 1323.Carbide's assertionthatithad released all ofthetoxicological in its possession on MIC was again repeated by itsvice-president and general of the Bhopal counsel, Joseph Goeghan, in a meetingwith representatives victimsin New York on May 6, 1991; see transcriptof that encounter (in typescript). 37. Ibid. All medical data on the victimsin this section are drawn from on studies undertakenby the Bhopal Rajiv Lochan's article,based primarily Gas Disaster Research Centre of the Indian Counsel of Medical Research, of MIC although several other studies of both the victimsand the toxicology both have been undertakenunder the auspices of otherresearchinstitutions, Indian and foreign,during the years since the disaster.For a more recent summaryof medical evidence, see Ramana Dhara, "Health Effectsof the e Prevenzione, no. 52 (1992). Bhopal Gas Leak: A Review,"Epidemiologia on CivilRights:Report 38. People s Union forCivilLiberties, Encroachment of an Investigation into 'Anti-encroachment Drive'" (reproducedas Appendix II in Bhopal Group for Informationand Action, Compensation Disbursement A Reportof a SurveyConducted and Possibilities: in ThreeGas Affected Problems BastisofBhopal (Bhopal: BGIA, January1992). See also other sections of this BGIA reportfordata on the currentstatusof processingcompensationclaims of the victims. 39. Claude Alvares, "In the Shadow of Despair,' The Illustrated Weekly of and Action, India, December 24, 1989.See also Bhopal Group forInformation Voices From Bhopal (Bhopal: BGIA, n.d.). 40. Dan Kurzman, A Killing Wind: Inside Union Carbide and the Bhopal
Ward Morehouse 503
2 and 3. The 1987), (NewYork:McGraw-Hill, chapters Catastrophe especially in the UnitedStatesand India is givenfrom of the Bhopal litigation story of otherbooks,including Morehouse and in a number varying perspectives Massacre Bhopal:The (Chicago:BannerPress,1986);SanjoyHazarika, Bhopal Lessons Books,1987);TaraJones, (NewDelhi: Penguin Corporate ofa Tragedy Books, 1988);Paul Killing: BhopalsWillHappen(London: Free Association Mass.:Ballinger a Crisis Shrivastava, Publishing (Cambridge, Bhopal: Anatomy of Co., 1987). and lengthy introductions 41. Keylegal documents have been reproduced in a three-volume different are contained analyzing phases of the litigation Forum and the Indian Law Institute: seriesfrom UpendraBaxi,Inconvenient
TheBhopalCase (Bombay:Tripathi, Convenient 1986); Upendra Baxi Catastrophe: and Multinational and Thomas Paul, Mass Disasters Liability:The Bhopal Case Subramaniam,note 5; Larry Everest,BehindthePoison Cloud: Union Carbides
butmanyotheraspects For numerous intonotonlythelitigation insights in the special issue of the Lokayan see the variousarticles of the disaster, Bulletin 6, nos. 1/2(1988), Appraisal." "Bhopal- An Interim of Union CarbideSince Bhopal," "The Restructuring 42. Wil Lepkowski, for bookedited atCornell University. bySheila Jasanof forthcoming manuscript 43. Ibid.,pp. 16-17. 44. Ibid.,p. 17. note6, pp. 111-113. 45. Dembo,Morehouse and Wykle, Abuse Power, of Power. See note6. on Abuse statement 46. UnionCarbide of Corporation in Bhopaland 47. Morehouse and Subramaniam, note5, on safety systems of Californiaat Pari Shafieri, doctoraldissertation, Institute; University A KillingWind, note 40, on the value of Indian 1990;Kurzman, Riverside, lives. note6, pp. 28-30. and Wykle, Abuse 48. Dembo,Morehouse, Power, of note32. 49. Cherniack, on Abuse note46. 50. UCC statement Power, of note6,p. 28. 51. Dembo,Morehouse and Wykle, Abuse ofPower, to achievegreater discussion of measures 52. Ibid.,p. 138.The remaining is drawn from 13 of Abuse (see note accountability ofPower chapter corporate accountof the biased and pro-industry 6). For a morerecentbut highly see the specialissue of Chemical Care Program, 7-14, Week, July Responsible 1993. other NewTheory," 53. "Carbide ComesUp With note33. See also various in the criminal case againstCarbide on recent newsreports developments and of victim and the adjudication and its officials claims,such as Business
PoliticalObserver April 9, 1993; TimesofIndia, March 7 and 30, 1993; Patriot,
TheBhopal Case (Bombay: Tripathi,1990). and LethalLitigation:
Victims 1986);UpendraBaxi and AmitaDhanda, Valiant (Bombay: Tripathi,
Economic 25 and April 9, 1993; Times, 3, 1993;TheHindu, February April April Times, 9, 1993. 1,1993;andHindustan April - BhopalSaga Continues "UnionCarbide 54. As quotedin WilLepkowski, in March Chemical and as Criminal News, Begin India," Engineering Proceedings 16,1992, p. 8. note40,p. 117. 55. Kurzman, A Killing Wind, note54,p. 8. 56. As quotedin Lepkowski, TheIllustrated 57. Claude Alvares, "The Greater Weekly of BhopalTragedy," December 1,1985. India,
504
World The EthicsofIndustrialDisastersin a Transnational
58. PermanentPeople's Tribunal (Bhopal Session), DraftCharterof Rights in Hazardous Industries; of Communities;DraftCharterof Rightsof Workers October 6, 1992. DraftCharterof Rightsof Victims, Sustainable 59. Robert Goodland, "Ethical Priorities in Environmentally Energy Systems: The Case of Tropical Hydropower,"paper prepared for International Colloquium on Energy Needs in the Year 2000 and Beyond: Ethical and Environmental Montreal,May 13-14,1993. Perspectives, bO. CommunitiesConcerned About Corporations, bounding Declaration 1993. and otherpapers on ethical production, April-July, 61. International Peoples Tribunal to Judge the G-7,Indictment (revised 7, 1993. provisionaltext), July 62. Richard Grossman and Frank Adams, "Dog Days at Company E Magazine, and theCorporateCharter," Headquarters:BusinessAccountability p. 47. For a fullerexplication of Grossman's thinkingon corporate charters as a means of making companies trulyaccountable, see his April 4, 1992, of PolicyStudies,as well as Grossman lettertoJohn Cavanagh at the Institute and theCharter and Adams, TakingCare ofBusiness:Citizenship ofIncorporation (Cambridge,Mass.: CharterInk, 1993). But Notthe first:Major IndustrialDisasters b3. See appendix 5, "The Worst in Morehouse and Subramaniam,note 5. For a recent and in This Century," of people against power,see Rajni Kothari, somberassessmentof the struggle 18 (Spring Alternatives "The YawningVacuum: A WorldWithout Alternatives," 1993): 119-139. Michael HenryHeim, and Forgrtting, 64. Milan Kundera,TheBookofLaughter trans.(New York:Knopf,1981).

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The Ethics of Industrial Disasters in a Transnational World: The Elusive Quest for Justice and Accountability in Bhopal Author(s):

18 (1993), 475-504 Alternatives

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16. Ibid.,p. 8. 17.UnionCarbide, note10,p. 81.

18. The TradeUnionReport on Bhopal,note 5, p. 9.

The EthicsofIndustrialDisastersin a Transnational World

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